1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for predicting the behavior time of a person.
2. Description of the Related Art
The problems of global warming and the control/management of chemical substances are now making society recognize that resources/energy and environmental capacity are not infinite. Under these circumstances, manufacturers are concentrating their efforts on developing goods and services with less environmental loads by adopting resource- and energy-saving technologies and pursuing recyclability. However, it is evident that such measures on the manufacturer side are not sufficient to establish a sustainable society. Especially, people cannot always select and practice living behaviors with less environmental loads. For example, a transportation means to take for a certain place and how to use a surplus time are hard to uniquely determine because they are closely associated with the senses of values, preferences, and life habits of individuals. To reduce the environmental load in the whole society, it is necessary to realize so-called “sustainable consumption” not only by reducing environmental loads directly generated upon producing and wasting goods and services but also by reducing environmental loads of consumption behaviors indirectly induced by the goods and services.
If a time necessary for achieving a desired purpose decreases, the operating time of goods and services also decreases. Hence, the consumption energy can also decrease at a high probability as the secondary effect. However, if much energy is consumed for another activity in a surplus time, the energy consumption within the same time may eventually be higher than that before introduction of the new goods and services. This side effect is called a rebound effect. A rebound effect can be observed when, e.g., “leisure time produced as a result of electronic commerce leads to an increase in number of times of travel”. To control the total environmental load generated in the whole society, it is necessary to evaluate not only environmental loads generated by goods and services themselves as ever but also environmental loads including the rebound effect and even social values in a broader sense.
Reference (Koji Takase, Yasushi Kondo, and Ayu Washizu, “An analysis of consumers' behavior by the waste input-output model: Environmental impact of income and time use” Transactions of the Institute of Life Cycle Assessment, Japan, 2-1 (2006), pp. 48-54) reports a model that predicts, on the basis of the utility maximization principle, a behavior when a consumption pattern changes under constraints on time and income, and calculates an environmental load caused by the behavior.
Reference assumes a rational human in standard economics. That is, a human is assumed to select a behavior to maximize the utility function. However, an actual human does not always select a rational behavior. In the prior art, it is therefore difficult to predict a human behavior based on realities of life under constraints on time and income.
As described above, conventionally, it is impossible to accurately predict a human behavior on the basis of realities of life.